Ultra progressive Portland sent Soros-backed, soft-on-crime District Attorney Mike Schmidt packing on Wednesday.
Residents backed Nathan Vasquez, one of Schmidt’s deputies, who campaigned on getting tough on crime. He received more than 50 percent of the vote after getting endorsed by a number of police groups.
Schmidt, one of the many woke prosecutors boosted into office by George Soros and affiliated soft-on-crime groups, took over in August 2020 at the height of the George Floyd protests and immediately announced the vast majority of riot-related offenses wouldn’t get prosecuted.
That December, he supported the ballot measure that essentially decriminalized all drug use.
It was a bad start to what has been a disastrous four years for the Rose City: Homicides hit a record high in 2022; the city declared a state of emergency after an explosion in fentanyl deaths; cops resigned en masse — with many citing Schmidt as the reason for their exit.
It’s no wonder Portlanders have had enough — and that the city has lost 22,000 residents since 2020.
Vasquez, a centrist and former Republican, won by vowing to end public drug use and dealing in Portland, repair ties with police and, essentially, return the DA’s office to its actual purpose — prosecuting crimes. (New York Post)
“The voters have made it clear that they are ready to take our county in a new and safer direction,” Vasquez said Wednesday, according to AP.
“I am committed to ending open air drug dealing and drug use while helping connect individuals to treatment, to rebuilding the broken relationships between the DA’s office and the community, and to ensuring that victims are the number one priority of my office,” he added.
Portland is a "Schmidt Show." But not if law & order candidate Nathan Vasquez wins. Schmidt is being blamed for all the Antifa madness and no consequence culture of allowing rampant crime to flourish in the city. https://t.co/bJDTXsWTUV pic.twitter.com/nrJPTKiBZz
— Jonathan Choe (@choeshow) May 22, 2024
Vasquez's victory is being seen with a healthy dose of cautious optimism.
.@DAMikeSchmidt being fired by voters is not a panacea. Even though the next DA, Nathan Vasquez, is a centrist who promises change, many judges in Multnomah County are leftist ideologues who will dismiss serious cases and release violent suspects from custody without even bail.…
— Andy Ngô 🏳️🌈 (@MrAndyNgo) May 22, 2024